Some good thoughts today on how the thing we think is the goal or the “target” often isn’t. First there’s Benjamin Sternke talking about the Cart Before the Horse, about the tendency to want to grow churches in order to impact culture rather than vice-versa…. which is kinda like wanting to see our culture impacted, but only on our terms, or worse, like saying we can only impact culture when we’ve got a big enough army to overpower it. Argh. Do people just not listen? The whole thing makes me wonder if we’ve done so much “means-to-an-end” thinking that we now just need to put an end to the means.
In other missional thought, my friend Di rants about how her “mission” is not people… and from atop her soapbox, she puts forward a darn good definition of what being “missional” is all about. Read it, you’ll get it… a point well-taken.
Thanks Bro for the link and the vote of confidence (in light of last night’s non-confidence vote in our government, please forgive the pun ;)).
Thanks for the positive comments. You post an interesting thought about “overpowering” culture – I think that is sometimes what people have in mind when we talk about transformation. But that’s the same mistake the Pharisees made, and most of the disciples, initially. But Jesus conquered by dying, as backward as that seems. “The Gentiles lord it over them, but it shall not be so with you.” The way of Jesus seems to look more like loving subversion than bullying power, which is why I like the name of your blog.